Here I Cannot Help Taking Notice Of The
Following Elegant Description From The Pharsalia, Which Seems To
Have Been Intended For This Very Harbour.
Finis et Hesperiae promoto milite varus,
Quaque sub Herculeo sacratus numine Portus
Urget rupe cava Pelagus, non Corus in illum
Jus habet, aut Zephirus, solus sua littora turbat
Circius, et tuta prohibet statione Monaeci.
The Troops advanc'd as far
As flows th' Hesperian Boundary, the Var;
And where the mountain scoop'd by nature's hands,
The spacious Port of Hercules, expands;
Here the tall ships at anchor safe remain
Tho' Zephyr blows, or Caurus sweeps the Plain;
The Southern Blast alone disturbs the Bay;
And to Monaco's safer Port obstructs the way.
The present town of Villa Franca was built and settled in the
thirteenth century, by order of Charles II. king of the Sicilies,
and count of Provence, in order to defend the harbour from the
descents of the Saracens, who at that time infested the coast.
The inhabitants were removed hither from another town, situated
on the top of a mountain in the neighbourhood, which those
pirates had destroyed. Some ruins of the old town are still
extant. In order to secure the harbour still more effectually,
Emanuel Philibert, duke of Savoy, built the fort in the beginning
of the last century, together with the mole where the gallies are
moored. As I said before, Ville Franche is built on the face of a
barren rock, washed by the sea; and there is not an acre of plain
ground within a mile of it.
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